Okay. Hoo boy. This day was a frenzy of movie watching. This is going to be a lot of stuff. Here we go...
SHORT FILMS CATEGORY - SHORTS A
Boca
Unfortunately, we only caught the credits of the film. Regrettable, since this was the one short film I was anticipating.
So, uhh... I guess the credits were, uh... good? 5000 awesome credits/?
Breakfast with Lolo
Short and simple. Based on what looks like a true story. A lolo and his grandson share some bonding time together. That's it. It's the little things in life that seem to strike us most profoundly. Those memories stick in your mind forever, and you are all the better for experiencing it.
TL;DR version: seize the day. It's cute. 3.5 pancakes/5
Dalaw
A woman (Che Ramos) visits her elderly grandmother. You have to kind of read between the lines to understand what's going on. It soon becomes clear her introspection reflects on her grandmother's own experiences. Excellently shot with good attention to shot composition and detail. My only complaint would be the audio. Sometimes you can barely hear any dialogue, so thank goodness for subtitles. 4 pinwheels /5
Despedida
Michael is a man who looks after his terminally ill parents. He then meets a cute girl (Angel Aquino) who totally talks to him out of the blue. This was a fun short, I'm sure the lot of you will get it midway. Great dialogue, straight to the point, pretty clever storywise. Solid. 3.5 tombstones/5
Faculty
Two college professors clash over conflicting beliefs regarding the education of students. For the record, I believe that participating in rallies is a choice and should not be forced upon students. True immersion in true participation takes a change in base attitudes. So I'm taking a middle ground between the two extremes presented in the film. I just don't fully agree with either prof. 3.5 shot glasses/5
NEW BREED CATEGORY
Halaw
A number of years ago, when I spent my vacation in Labuan, a small island in Sabah, Malaysia, I came across a small riverside 'town-on-stilts,' much like the seaside communities of the Badjao in many parts of Mindanao. Not surprisingly, most of the inhabitants of that community was comprised of illegal immigrants from the Philippines, some of them probably distant relatives of mine. My uncle then told me that such things were commonplace here; people engage in trafficking persons inside Malaysia from the Philippines (and sometimes even vice versa,) as the distance between the two countries by sea isn't that far at all. Since then I've heard that the community was torn down by Malaysian authorities.
So this year's offering by Sherwin Dayoc, Halaw, hits me deeply in a personal way, because I have seen this activity before. The setting is Tawi-Tawi (although it can be any of the island provinces in Western Mindanao/ARMM) where Jahid and his daughter (according to the pamphlet anyway, but IIRC from the dialogue she was his sister) Daying are preparing to make the trip to Sabah on boat. The movie gives us hints that the mother has already made the trip, and the two are preparing to join her there.
The person responsible for their trip is Hernand, a kind of fixer responsible for white slavery to and from Malaysia. Although he seems reassuring towards his clients, it's obvious that part of this recruitment has something to do with some illegal sex trade ring, and he's exactly not after the best interests of the people he approaches.
Along with other people who embark on the trip on dreams of their own, in order to escape a life where they see no future, they chug along the precarious seas to the nearest Malaysian island.
Around 70 percent of the dialog is in Tausug. There are subtitles to accompany the spoken dialogue, but it is not a line by line translation. The subs capture the gist of the dialogue but some people may wonder why the subtitles look inconsistent. I can understand the a good chunk of the language so I hardly needed the subs anyway, but I wonder how it went for the other moviegoers that didn't understand the language.
The acting is solid, with accomplished actors and non-actors joining the fray. Nothing looks manufactured or artificial, as the acting is more or less natural and flows well with the story.
The movie looks gorgeous in its own unique way. In contrast with Mayohan which used vibrant colors and saturation of light, Halaw is filmed mostly at night, with a darker palette; some even taking place in near total darkness. Yet still, the shots are well made, overcoming technical limitations with digital video and darkness, much as Mayohan did with scenes during the night. This is thanks to clever lighting and possibly filming close to dawn or dusk when a little sunlight accentuates the seascape.
Halaw is a prime example of film as a voice for social issues at large. Being a documentary filmmaker, Sherwin Dayoc uses this story to tell us about the issue of illegal human trafficking in Mindanao. That is the point of the movie itself; using these characters and their stories to point to a reality that few of us know. And in it, the sea itself takes a curious role as a player in this film, being a vast barrier to an uncertain future, meaning both life and death to many.
Definitely one of the most unique movies I've seen in the festival to date. 7.5 illegal immigrants over 10.
The Leaving
A man begins to leave his old life to start over from scratch. An illicit affair spirals into destruction. A wife struggles with the nuances and difficulties of married life.
The Leaving is hard to categorize. It is part Asian horror movie, part love story, part drama. Set in the backdrop of the Chinese Ghost Festival, or Spirit Day, where spirits of loved ones come out from the lower realms, The Leaving is composed of three different interrelated stories occuring in the same time frame (as one segment finishes, the other loops back to the beginning of this time frame, but from a different perspective) revealing a piece of the whole picture one at a time.
The matryoshka doll-like structure of the film appeals to me a great deal, as aspects of scenes from the first part of the film make more sense in the second part, and even more sense by the end. It's such an engaging experience to unravel another part of the story. The Simpsons had an episode like this, IIRC, and (in a way) so did the 2004 movie Primer (see my review of Primer in my blog entry for the Alfred Sloan Prize winners)
The first segment reminds me a bit of the "expired pineapple" Chungking Express segment, with its themes of loneliness and the inability to move on. Oh, and there's horror. It's not too jarring, and the spirits that Martin sees seem to be natural here. One would expect a garbled mishmash of genres at the end, but for some reason it works. I can't exactly explain why.
The second segment amps up the horror a bit. It explains a few peculiar things during our first 'run through' of the whole story. As the first tells us of the impact the lack of love brings to one's life, this part tells us that love is destructive. And if I didn't make it clear before, there's MORE horror.
The third segment wraps it up, tying both the first and second segments neatly, returning to the Wong Kar-wai-ish themes of transcience, loneliness and longing that punctuated the first. There is a seeming impermanence in the world by the actions of the characters and the apartment complex-as-living-organism. And by the way, there's EVEN MORE horror.
The film's characters are all Tsinoys in one form or another, and the film is a reflection on Filipino-Chinese cultural values. Martin admits that he hasn't gone to temples that much anymore. His parents have migrated to the US. I find it interesting that I didn't realize that some characters were Tsinoys at all; in a way a loss of cultural identity.
On the other hand, some aspects of the culture don't change at all - more a fault of human nature than anything else. Marriages break down and concubines run aplenty, and the wife is still expected to be obedient to the husband. Most telling is the part where one character, after telling her mother of her husband's infidelity, is scolded by that same mother to be a dutiful wife, saying that all this is the wife's fault. Now the wife is beginning to stray from cultural norms (I'm not an expert on Chinese culture so feel free to correct me) but does that justify staying to the old cultural roots?
The movie for me would have been perfect if not for the audio. I'm just going to spit it out: I'm not sure if it's because of a technical problem at the time of screening, but the audio was terrible. Some scenes have characters talking so faintly that you could not hear them (and I was seated near the speakers) either drowned out by something else, or something's screwed up with the levels. Subtitles helped salvage that. Another problem with the audio is it makes transitions and/or scare moments obvious, since you can audibly hear the audio track or whatever changing - making key scenes easily read by the audience.
All in all I think we have a winner here people. This was a film that surprised me with its unique plot structure and mix of themes. Go ahead and watch it. And tell me if there was really a problem with the audio. I'm giving this 9 hungry ghosts out of 10, minus 0.5 for the poor audio.
DIRECTOR'S SHOWCASE CATEGORY
Pink Halo-Halo
The life of a soldier is a hard one; he constantly faces death in the eye away form his loved ones, a short vacation his only respite. It's a lonely life, but one filled with honor. To those that lose their lives for their country, however, the pain for the ones that they leave behind is all too real. This film, directed by Joselito Altarejos, is dedicated to (presumably) his father, a 2nd Lieutenant who died in the seventies. In essence, the film's purpose is similar to the short Breakfast with Lolo (see above.)
Natoy is just like any other kid; he fights mock gun battles with his friends, he goes to school like any other kid. In this film he acts as a persona or reflection of the director himself. He has a close relationship with his father, a corporal in the Philippine Army. Natoy does not like the fact that his father has to go to all these places and risk his life as it makes his mother sad.
There isn't much more to say as the message of the film is very simple. At the same time, the film is a statement in itself about war and the damage it causes not only to the people directly involved, but with collateral damage along the way. Natoy's brother participates in a play detailing the war between Moros and Christians; movies glorifying war are strewn all over the local cineplex; the shooting games the boys play also figure into the overall picture.
The images are clear and crisp, captured in glorious HD. There are a lot of yellow and orange hues especially in the Halo-Halo store. The acting is great on all sides; the kid who played Natoy was pretty good.
So take a peek at this film. It's okay by me. 7 wooden guns over 10.
EXTRA! MIDNIGHT SHOW
This one isn't in the competition, but since I watched it, what the hell, right?
Ben & Sam
Ben is a film student who plays basketball and stuff. Sam is also a film student who happens to be gay. You know where this is going, right? Come on.
Unfortunately, the film comes off as overindulgent, and tries too hard to be artsy. There is lavish attention to detail (more on that later) but with no extras many scenes look weird. It's as if the college they were attending had a total of 15 students.
Cinematography and set design are quite good. Good use of the camera on some scenes, but again, some shots are just overindulgent. The acting is okay. The lady who play's Ben's slightly off kilter mother steals the show with her weird dialogue and actions. The lady who plays Ben's girlfriend is a love or hate thing. She will either annoy you or entertain you with her histrionics.
The apple becomes a cinematic motif, signifying the forbidden fruit. They really love those apples though, and I mean that in more ways than one. See what I did there? Another thing I noticed is that considering the taboo nature of this relationship in our society today, people in relative authority (parents and coaches and whatnot) in this film tend to approve the relationship of the titular characters. Which is something I felt a bit off.
Well enough about that. The most interesting parts of the film to me are the debates about film that are in essence reflective of this very film. The debates talk about the depiction of truth; yet in this film, at first, the truth is something none of the characters seem to accept. The debates talk about how the depiction of an unconventional relationship and how it evolves, and in this film that's exactly what we see.
Finally, the debates talk about gay films themselves. Perhaps an appeal to legitimacy? I've seen that some people tend to stereotype independent films with gay films. Now look back at all the films I've reviewed this week. How many of them are gay films other than this one? I'll wait. Are you back yet? The answer is zero, right? Others seem to reject the film a priori based only on the concept that it is a gay film. As far as I'm concerned, if the movie it's good, it's good. I really don't care what it is about. I hope the genre doesn't become a cliche, and I fear it already might have done so.
That, however, is the problem with this film. I'll be frank and say it wasn't that good. It offers nothing new, and instead of making the viewer involved, via an emotional connection, it decides to fanservice and tittilate (at least for some people out there.) Sone scenes don't flow smoothly and exist only to establish something, or don't have a point at all. And conversely, some scenes linger too much on the subject, pressing the point over and over again. Case in point: we GET it, you're super sad about (end of the film.) On to the credits please.
Do yourself a favor and skip this one. If you're still interested I'm not going to stop you, but there are far more interesting films both in same genre and tackling the same concepts, done in a more satisfying way.
Plus, interpretative dance? oooookaaayyyy....
SHORT FILMS CATEGORY - SHORTS A
Boca
Unfortunately, we only caught the credits of the film. Regrettable, since this was the one short film I was anticipating.
So, uhh... I guess the credits were, uh... good? 5000 awesome credits/?
Breakfast with Lolo
Short and simple. Based on what looks like a true story. A lolo and his grandson share some bonding time together. That's it. It's the little things in life that seem to strike us most profoundly. Those memories stick in your mind forever, and you are all the better for experiencing it.
TL;DR version: seize the day. It's cute. 3.5 pancakes/5
Dalaw
A woman (Che Ramos) visits her elderly grandmother. You have to kind of read between the lines to understand what's going on. It soon becomes clear her introspection reflects on her grandmother's own experiences. Excellently shot with good attention to shot composition and detail. My only complaint would be the audio. Sometimes you can barely hear any dialogue, so thank goodness for subtitles. 4 pinwheels /5
Despedida
Michael is a man who looks after his terminally ill parents. He then meets a cute girl (Angel Aquino) who totally talks to him out of the blue. This was a fun short, I'm sure the lot of you will get it midway. Great dialogue, straight to the point, pretty clever storywise. Solid. 3.5 tombstones/5
Faculty
Two college professors clash over conflicting beliefs regarding the education of students. For the record, I believe that participating in rallies is a choice and should not be forced upon students. True immersion in true participation takes a change in base attitudes. So I'm taking a middle ground between the two extremes presented in the film. I just don't fully agree with either prof. 3.5 shot glasses/5
NEW BREED CATEGORY
Halaw
A number of years ago, when I spent my vacation in Labuan, a small island in Sabah, Malaysia, I came across a small riverside 'town-on-stilts,' much like the seaside communities of the Badjao in many parts of Mindanao. Not surprisingly, most of the inhabitants of that community was comprised of illegal immigrants from the Philippines, some of them probably distant relatives of mine. My uncle then told me that such things were commonplace here; people engage in trafficking persons inside Malaysia from the Philippines (and sometimes even vice versa,) as the distance between the two countries by sea isn't that far at all. Since then I've heard that the community was torn down by Malaysian authorities.
So this year's offering by Sherwin Dayoc, Halaw, hits me deeply in a personal way, because I have seen this activity before. The setting is Tawi-Tawi (although it can be any of the island provinces in Western Mindanao/ARMM) where Jahid and his daughter (according to the pamphlet anyway, but IIRC from the dialogue she was his sister) Daying are preparing to make the trip to Sabah on boat. The movie gives us hints that the mother has already made the trip, and the two are preparing to join her there.
The person responsible for their trip is Hernand, a kind of fixer responsible for white slavery to and from Malaysia. Although he seems reassuring towards his clients, it's obvious that part of this recruitment has something to do with some illegal sex trade ring, and he's exactly not after the best interests of the people he approaches.
Along with other people who embark on the trip on dreams of their own, in order to escape a life where they see no future, they chug along the precarious seas to the nearest Malaysian island.
Around 70 percent of the dialog is in Tausug. There are subtitles to accompany the spoken dialogue, but it is not a line by line translation. The subs capture the gist of the dialogue but some people may wonder why the subtitles look inconsistent. I can understand the a good chunk of the language so I hardly needed the subs anyway, but I wonder how it went for the other moviegoers that didn't understand the language.
The acting is solid, with accomplished actors and non-actors joining the fray. Nothing looks manufactured or artificial, as the acting is more or less natural and flows well with the story.
The movie looks gorgeous in its own unique way. In contrast with Mayohan which used vibrant colors and saturation of light, Halaw is filmed mostly at night, with a darker palette; some even taking place in near total darkness. Yet still, the shots are well made, overcoming technical limitations with digital video and darkness, much as Mayohan did with scenes during the night. This is thanks to clever lighting and possibly filming close to dawn or dusk when a little sunlight accentuates the seascape.
Halaw is a prime example of film as a voice for social issues at large. Being a documentary filmmaker, Sherwin Dayoc uses this story to tell us about the issue of illegal human trafficking in Mindanao. That is the point of the movie itself; using these characters and their stories to point to a reality that few of us know. And in it, the sea itself takes a curious role as a player in this film, being a vast barrier to an uncertain future, meaning both life and death to many.
Definitely one of the most unique movies I've seen in the festival to date. 7.5 illegal immigrants over 10.
The Leaving
A man begins to leave his old life to start over from scratch. An illicit affair spirals into destruction. A wife struggles with the nuances and difficulties of married life.
The Leaving is hard to categorize. It is part Asian horror movie, part love story, part drama. Set in the backdrop of the Chinese Ghost Festival, or Spirit Day, where spirits of loved ones come out from the lower realms, The Leaving is composed of three different interrelated stories occuring in the same time frame (as one segment finishes, the other loops back to the beginning of this time frame, but from a different perspective) revealing a piece of the whole picture one at a time.
The matryoshka doll-like structure of the film appeals to me a great deal, as aspects of scenes from the first part of the film make more sense in the second part, and even more sense by the end. It's such an engaging experience to unravel another part of the story. The Simpsons had an episode like this, IIRC, and (in a way) so did the 2004 movie Primer (see my review of Primer in my blog entry for the Alfred Sloan Prize winners)
The first segment reminds me a bit of the "expired pineapple" Chungking Express segment, with its themes of loneliness and the inability to move on. Oh, and there's horror. It's not too jarring, and the spirits that Martin sees seem to be natural here. One would expect a garbled mishmash of genres at the end, but for some reason it works. I can't exactly explain why.
The second segment amps up the horror a bit. It explains a few peculiar things during our first 'run through' of the whole story. As the first tells us of the impact the lack of love brings to one's life, this part tells us that love is destructive. And if I didn't make it clear before, there's MORE horror.
The third segment wraps it up, tying both the first and second segments neatly, returning to the Wong Kar-wai-ish themes of transcience, loneliness and longing that punctuated the first. There is a seeming impermanence in the world by the actions of the characters and the apartment complex-as-living-organism. And by the way, there's EVEN MORE horror.
The film's characters are all Tsinoys in one form or another, and the film is a reflection on Filipino-Chinese cultural values. Martin admits that he hasn't gone to temples that much anymore. His parents have migrated to the US. I find it interesting that I didn't realize that some characters were Tsinoys at all; in a way a loss of cultural identity.
On the other hand, some aspects of the culture don't change at all - more a fault of human nature than anything else. Marriages break down and concubines run aplenty, and the wife is still expected to be obedient to the husband. Most telling is the part where one character, after telling her mother of her husband's infidelity, is scolded by that same mother to be a dutiful wife, saying that all this is the wife's fault. Now the wife is beginning to stray from cultural norms (I'm not an expert on Chinese culture so feel free to correct me) but does that justify staying to the old cultural roots?
The movie for me would have been perfect if not for the audio. I'm just going to spit it out: I'm not sure if it's because of a technical problem at the time of screening, but the audio was terrible. Some scenes have characters talking so faintly that you could not hear them (and I was seated near the speakers) either drowned out by something else, or something's screwed up with the levels. Subtitles helped salvage that. Another problem with the audio is it makes transitions and/or scare moments obvious, since you can audibly hear the audio track or whatever changing - making key scenes easily read by the audience.
All in all I think we have a winner here people. This was a film that surprised me with its unique plot structure and mix of themes. Go ahead and watch it. And tell me if there was really a problem with the audio. I'm giving this 9 hungry ghosts out of 10, minus 0.5 for the poor audio.
DIRECTOR'S SHOWCASE CATEGORY
Pink Halo-Halo
The life of a soldier is a hard one; he constantly faces death in the eye away form his loved ones, a short vacation his only respite. It's a lonely life, but one filled with honor. To those that lose their lives for their country, however, the pain for the ones that they leave behind is all too real. This film, directed by Joselito Altarejos, is dedicated to (presumably) his father, a 2nd Lieutenant who died in the seventies. In essence, the film's purpose is similar to the short Breakfast with Lolo (see above.)
Natoy is just like any other kid; he fights mock gun battles with his friends, he goes to school like any other kid. In this film he acts as a persona or reflection of the director himself. He has a close relationship with his father, a corporal in the Philippine Army. Natoy does not like the fact that his father has to go to all these places and risk his life as it makes his mother sad.
There isn't much more to say as the message of the film is very simple. At the same time, the film is a statement in itself about war and the damage it causes not only to the people directly involved, but with collateral damage along the way. Natoy's brother participates in a play detailing the war between Moros and Christians; movies glorifying war are strewn all over the local cineplex; the shooting games the boys play also figure into the overall picture.
The images are clear and crisp, captured in glorious HD. There are a lot of yellow and orange hues especially in the Halo-Halo store. The acting is great on all sides; the kid who played Natoy was pretty good.
So take a peek at this film. It's okay by me. 7 wooden guns over 10.
EXTRA! MIDNIGHT SHOW
This one isn't in the competition, but since I watched it, what the hell, right?
Ben & Sam
Ben is a film student who plays basketball and stuff. Sam is also a film student who happens to be gay. You know where this is going, right? Come on.
Unfortunately, the film comes off as overindulgent, and tries too hard to be artsy. There is lavish attention to detail (more on that later) but with no extras many scenes look weird. It's as if the college they were attending had a total of 15 students.
Cinematography and set design are quite good. Good use of the camera on some scenes, but again, some shots are just overindulgent. The acting is okay. The lady who play's Ben's slightly off kilter mother steals the show with her weird dialogue and actions. The lady who plays Ben's girlfriend is a love or hate thing. She will either annoy you or entertain you with her histrionics.
The apple becomes a cinematic motif, signifying the forbidden fruit. They really love those apples though, and I mean that in more ways than one. See what I did there? Another thing I noticed is that considering the taboo nature of this relationship in our society today, people in relative authority (parents and coaches and whatnot) in this film tend to approve the relationship of the titular characters. Which is something I felt a bit off.
Well enough about that. The most interesting parts of the film to me are the debates about film that are in essence reflective of this very film. The debates talk about the depiction of truth; yet in this film, at first, the truth is something none of the characters seem to accept. The debates talk about how the depiction of an unconventional relationship and how it evolves, and in this film that's exactly what we see.
Finally, the debates talk about gay films themselves. Perhaps an appeal to legitimacy? I've seen that some people tend to stereotype independent films with gay films. Now look back at all the films I've reviewed this week. How many of them are gay films other than this one? I'll wait. Are you back yet? The answer is zero, right? Others seem to reject the film a priori based only on the concept that it is a gay film. As far as I'm concerned, if the movie it's good, it's good. I really don't care what it is about. I hope the genre doesn't become a cliche, and I fear it already might have done so.
That, however, is the problem with this film. I'll be frank and say it wasn't that good. It offers nothing new, and instead of making the viewer involved, via an emotional connection, it decides to fanservice and tittilate (at least for some people out there.) Sone scenes don't flow smoothly and exist only to establish something, or don't have a point at all. And conversely, some scenes linger too much on the subject, pressing the point over and over again. Case in point: we GET it, you're super sad about (end of the film.) On to the credits please.
Do yourself a favor and skip this one. If you're still interested I'm not going to stop you, but there are far more interesting films both in same genre and tackling the same concepts, done in a more satisfying way.
Plus, interpretative dance? oooookaaayyyy....
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